280 
QIEGAPODIDiE. 
level ground) is cleared of almost every fallen leaf and twig. 
The mounds are often six feet in height, and twelve to fourteen 
yards wide at the base ; sometimes they are more conical. The 
central portion consists of decayed leaves mixed with line debris, 
the next of coarser and less rotted materials ; and the outside is 
a mass of recently gathered leaves, sticks, and twigs not showing 
signs of decay. In opening the nest these arc easily removed, 
and must be carefully pushed backwards over the sides, beginning 
at the top. Having cleared these, and obtained plenty of room 
remove the semidecayed strata, and below it where the 
fermentation has begun, in a mass of light line leaf-mould will be 
found the eggs placed with the thin end downwards, often in a 
circle, with three or four in the centre, about six inches apart. 
At one side, where the eggs have been first laid they will probably 
be found more or less incubated, but in the centre where the 
eggs are placed last, quite fresh ; and if only one pair of birds 
have laid in the mound, about twelve to eighteen eggs will be the 
complement, and will be found arranged as described above. On 
the other hand, if several females resort to the same nest the 
regularity will be greatly interfered with and two or three eggs 
in different stages of development will be found close to one another, 
some quite fresh, others within a few days of being hatched. 
There are usually ten eggs in the first layer, five or six in the 
second, three or four only in the centre. I found that the females 
return every second day to lay, but never succeeded in ascertaining 
which of the parent birds opens the nest. The aborigines informed 
me that the male bird always performs this office; and I usually 
found my black boys very correct in their statements of this kind. 
After robbing a nest it is necessary to replace the different layers 
as they were found, if the lowermost is too much mixed up with 
the others, or the the top tumbled into the excavations made in 
the bottom one, the birds will invariably forsake the mound ; so 
that I found it always necessary to carefully replace the different 
layers as I found them. It is not so with the Meycvpodius tumulus, 
which species does not seem to care how much the mound is tumbled 
about, so that there is sufficient debris left to burrow in ; and 
